Behind the scenes of the film shooting

Written by Engel & Völkers on 11/9/15

As of 30 October, N24 is airing the new Engel & Völkers TV show "Faszination Wohnen – Engel & Völkers exklusiv " every Friday at 2:30 pm. The show is being presented by Natascha Israel, Senior Online Marketing Manager, who also accompanied the film crew to the various shooting locations. We spoke with her about the background of the TV show and her experiences on site.

What is the purpose of the new TV show?

The new TV show offers our license partners the opportunity to, for the first time, present exclusive real estate in the media with a large area of coverage. This media format addresses our main target audience as well as the wider public, who can enjoy insider views of some truly remarkable real estate from around the world.

What was the biggest challenge during the shooting?

The biggest challenge was definitely the weather and the tight schedule. In other words, things that were mostly beyond our control. You need sunny weather and blue skies to make great-looking outdoor shots of real estate, and drones don't fly in strong winds and rain. We increased our chances of having good weather by filming in summer and autumn. When the weather was bad, we waited for the sun to come out again, at least for a while, to take the outdoor shots - and we were lucky most of the time. The weather along the Cote d'Azur was pretty dramatic when we landed. We arrived on a Sunday and the whole of the Cote d'Azur was flooded after a storm. Antibes, the town where our hotel was located, was particularly hard-hit. In three hours, the French Riviera had seen as much rain as normally falls in two entire months on average. So the team had to improvise: Everything - the hotel, the accommodation, the shooting - seemed to be descending into chaos. But in the end everything worked out, fortunately.

Do you have a personal favourite? Which property did you like most?

The properties were all quite stunning, but also very different - it would be impossible for me to pick one! But there were a few where I would have felt comfortable staying. We were all inspired - and brought back some concrete decor ideas for our own homes. If I would choose to build a pool now, I would know exactly what it would look like ;-).

Apart from this, it was also quite special being in the former villa of Estée Lauder and feeling her spirit. The current owners had taken over some of their famous predecessor's interior design concepts, and there were also still some old drawings, notes and pictures of the cosmetics entrepreneur.

What did you enjoy most?

What I enjoyed most was working with the team, the close interaction with our license partners and the feeling of really experiencing the international network of Engel & Völkers first-hand! Both the production and the final result reflect our core values of competence, exclusivity and passion in a very impressive visual manner.

Were there any glitches?

Well, our video dronebroke down while we were shooting in Port D'Andratx (Mallorca). The camera team wanted to shoot from a certain perspective and, unfortunately, overlooked the outdoor shower - which gave us all quite a fright. Luckily, the N24 team was able to fix the damage quickly, allowing us to continue with the shooting - they are really good at what they do. In a sense, a film shooting is always quite exciting, because its success depends on many different factors: The weather must play along, the interview partners should not cancel at the last moment or become ill and the technical equipment must function properly. It is exactly this mix which makes the work exciting, and if the end result is well received, it makes it all worthwhile.